The unforgettable ache of “Jolene” — a plea wrapped in admiration, envy and heartbreak — has long stood as one of Dolly Parton’s defining musical moments.
Just hours after Dolly Parton died Tuesday at the age of 80, Jack White stepped onto a London stage and paid tribute with the song that has traveled across generations, reimagined by artists ranging from the White Stripes and Beyoncé to Miley Cyrus and Olivia Newton-John.
Ahead of the performance, White shared a black-and-white image of a young Parton on social media, pairing it with a brief but emphatic caption: “Instant sainthood.”
In today’s relentless culture-war climate — especially given White’s frequent criticism of Donald Trump and his supporters — some might have expected the former president to respond to Parton’s death with the same kind of posthumous dismissal he directed at figures such as Rob Reiner and Robert Mueller.
That did not happen.
Within an hour of the news, Trump posted a tribute on Truth Social, calling Parton “one of the greatest Country singers, and far beyond, EVER,” adding that “there has never been anyone like her, and never will.” He closed simply: “Rest in Peace, Dolly! The World loves you.”
It is hard to argue with that sentiment: there will never be another Dolly Parton.
The larger question is whether American culture can ever produce another figure quite like her.
There will never be another Dolly Parton. But will there ever be another like her?
Throughout her career, fans were always laying claim to Parton.
A gay icon, there were whispers that Parton was romantically linked to her never-married childhood best friend Judy Ogle. She lovingly wrote about Ogle in her 1994 memoir, My Life and Other Unfinished Business: ‘I don’t know what I would have done in my life without Judy. That’s as pure a love as I have ever known, and that’s a stronger bond than I have ever known.’
Ogle toured with Parton as a hairstylist and assistant and often slept in her bed, but when journalists pried into Parton’s private life, she parried the intrusion with grace and humor.
‘I’m not gay. If I was gay, I would have come out of the closet just a-flying,’ she said in 2012.
In line with the great American tradition of letting people live their lives the way they want if they’re not hurting anyone else, Parton – a woman of faith – donated generously to LGBT causes and once joked that she entered a Dolly Parton drag lookalike contest but lost because the judges thought she was a ‘small gay guy’, if not a little too over the top.
Political correctness wasn’t her thing either.
In 2016, when politicos took her support for a future female president of the United States to be an endorsement of Hillary Clinton, Parton quickly clarified.
‘I try not to get political but if I am, I might as well just run myself ’cause I’ve got the hair for it… and they could always use more boobs in the race… I have not decided who I’m voting for, but no matter what we’re gonna be suffering from PMS, Presidential Mood Swings,’ she posted on Facebook.
Parton knew what she was doing, of course.
Why, she asked interviewers over the years, would she take sides in a political fight and potentially alienate half her fan base?
The answer was an easy one for a woman as ambitious as she was. She had the kind of drive that often only comes from starting life near the bottom.
Political correctness wasn’t her thing
There were whispers that Parton was romantically linked to her never-married childhood best friend Judy Ogle
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‘I try not to get political but if I am, I might as well just run myself,’ she once said
Born into rural Appalachian poverty in 1946 on the banks of the Little Pigeon River in Pittman Center, Tennessee, a stone’s throw from the Smoky Mountains, Parton’s illiterate, sharecropper father gifted the attending physician who birthed her a sack of cornmeal.
Growing up in hand-me-downs while fighting for scraps in her big family, the fourth child of 12 and the daughter of a musician-mother with Welsh roots, who taught her to sing and play the fiddle, Parton was a force of nature.
At the age of 13, she burst onto the scene in 1959 on the Grand Ole Opry stage, introduced by Johnny Cash, with her first single ‘Puppy Love.’
Parton said she always longed to be pretty and crafted a ‘Backwoods Barbie’ look of rhinestones, long nails, big hair and bigger boobs.
A human disco ball, she was as self-made as they come.
Moving to Nashville at 18, she commanded songwriting sessions, men’s affection and the deep respect of everyone in her orbit, who were all forced to admit this bedazzled firecracker was far more than a taffy-sweet piece of eye candy, earning her the moniker Iron Butterfly.
It’s so telling that the tributes pouring in from other entertainment legends memorialize Parton, first and foremost, as a songwriter. Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney, Lee Greenwood, fellas who know a thing or two about a catchy jam, praise her writing above all else.
That gift was something else that could only come from genuine experience – a life lived hard.
Anyone who’s listened to Jolene knows there’s no way Parton could have manufactured that song’s urgency, desperation and sincerity out of thin air. The song was, in fact, written about a saucy redheaded bank teller who was overly flirtatious with her husband Carl Dean.
Married for 58 years, Carl Dean died in 2025. He was reportedly never around and refused to join his wife in her favorite places, like Hawaii and Los Angeles. They had a rumored open marriage, and although the Queen of Country demurred when asked about any extramarital dalliances – and famously said in 2012, ‘I’ve been accused of being involved with every man I’m ever seen with or worked with. Maybe I have, maybe I ain’t. I never tell if I have’ – she never said a bad word about the man.
Perhaps that is what most set Dolly Parton apart from the others, a quality that has become so rare in a world of social media feuds and relationships lived on Instagram: her kindness.
At the age of 13, she burst onto the scene in 1959 on the Grand Ole Opry stage, introduced by Johnny Cash, with her first single ‘Puppy Love’
Married for 59 years, her husband Carl Dean died in 2025
Parton was famously sued by her former manager Porter Wagoner for breach of contract after she launched her solo career, later settling with him for $1 million. But still, Parton reconciled with Wagoner and even helped him through financial problems late in his life.
The record that set Parton on her way to stardom and the greatest hit that kept giving was her song I Will Always Love You. She maintained 100 percent of the publishing rights for the song after turning down Colonel Tom Parker, who wanted Elvis to record the emotional ballad while taking half her royalties.
Whitney Houston crushed a cover in 1992’s The Bodyguard and nabbed Parton millions in mailbox money throughout the 90s, which Parton later paid forward.
In 1997, she donated $10 million in Houston’s name to an impoverished black neighborhood in Nashville saying, ‘This is the house that Whitney built.’
And this is the legacy Dolly Parton built.
Parton was available to everyone and owned by no one. A hard-working, honest striver who always remained faithful to herself – a true embodiment of the American dream.
No, there will never be another like her, but she’s left an example for us all to follow.
While we will miss her wit and talent, we will always have her music and we will always love Dolly Parton.
